A recent development in the WikiLeaks case puts the focus on
government lawyers, who were asked to defend their tactics in their criminal
investigation of WikiLeaks, which published secret US government documents on
the internet.Three individuals under investigation – Birgitta
Jonsdottir, Rop Gonggrijp and Jacob Appelbaum – are being represented by
organizations such as the ACLU and the Electronic Frontier Foundation and are
defending their rights against government questioning.The government is requesting information
regarding the individuals’ Twitter accounts.

According to the ACLU’s Aden Fine, “What’s at stake here is
the ability to use the internet freely and privately, without the government
looking over their shoulder.”

The primary individuals involved in the government’s case,
Julian Assange, founder of WikiLeaks, and Pfc. Bradley Manning, the Army
intelligence specialist who has been accused of leaking the documents, are not
involved in this hearing.

Regarding the main case against the website, lawyers
representing Julian Assange believe that the US Justice Department does not
have the jurisdiction to prosecute the WikiLeaks founder or regulate the
internet in any way.Because Assange is a
resident of Australia, he cannot be tried for treason in the United States.

Although Hillary Clinton has recently stated the importance
of internet freedom, she also defended the government’s actions in the
WikiLeaks case.

The Supreme Court has ruled in favor of the world’s largest
watch maker, Omega, which claimed recently that the warehouse club Costco was reselling Swatch watches,
a division of Omega, at reduced prices without the consent of the Swiss
watchmaker.This, according to the
Supreme Court, is a violation of U.S. copyright laws.

Due to the absence of justice Kagen, who worked with the
case prior to becoming a justice, the ruling was tied at 4-4, a ruling that favors Omega,
whom the court ruled retained the rights to its watches, even when imported to
the United States. Because there was a tie and no subsequent ruling, the previous ruling in a similar case stands, which is bad news for Costco.

In its defense, Costco attorneys asked that the Supreme Court extend a
1998 case that sold products made in a country back to the United States,
determining whether copyright laws could be attributed to items imported from
overseas.

Without justice Kagen, this is the first of twenty cases
that has resulted in a tie.

Recently, rare national class action status was granted
against Conseco Life Insurance on the grounds that the insurance company had a
breach of contract with seven policy holders.The policy holders will be
represented by the Gilbert firm of Washington, D.C. and the Millstein &
Associates firm of San Francisco.The
case was first filed in 2008 and was approved by U.S. District Judge Susan
Illston on October 6.

According to Millstein, one of the lawyers representing the
policyholders, “In many cases, when plaintiffs attempt to bring national class
actions on consumer claims, defendants are able to defeat the class actions by
arguing that there are significant variations among consumers or among the
legal standards applicable in different states, but in our case the court found
that Conseco treated all policyholders essentially the same way across the
country and that there are no significant variations in state contract
law."

Stephen Weisbrod, whose firm partners with the Gilbert law
firm in Washington, D.C. and has experience as an insurance lawyer, said, "many other 'vanishing premium' life
insurance cases have failed."

The claim states that Conseco was breaching approximately
10,000 “Lifetrend” insurance policies, and that they had contractual violations
regarding improper charges and deductions.Despite Conseco’s claim that the plaintiffs hadn’t analyzed state laws
regarding the claims, in accordance with the court order.This claim, however, was denied.

According to the judge, “"Contrary to Conseco's
representations, several courts have recognized that the law relating to the
element of breach does not vary greatly from state to state."Because the claims are similar in multiple
states, the case received national class action suit status.

Chapter 7 bankruptcy is the most
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